


A Bread Made in Heaven

by Againstme



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Baking, Baking together and being very obviously in love, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-02
Updated: 2019-11-02
Packaged: 2021-01-20 19:18:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21286844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Againstme/pseuds/Againstme
Summary: Martin moves over and watches how his boyfriend handles the dough. He's awkward with it, tentative and gentle, as if he's scared of hurting it somehow."Is this, uh, am I doing this right?" Jon asks, still slowly stretching out the dough and folding it onto itself."Well," he says shifting closer to Jon again, "you could be applying more pressure. Here, let me help you out, dear."Martin moves fully behind Jon, and reaches around him, putting his hands on top of his boyfriend's. Jon inhales sharply, but doesn't say anything else, just lets Martin's hand rest on top of his.Martin's hands are bigger, but not big enough to entirely envelop the other's hands, and Jon's hands are much, much warmer than his own are. To see what they're doing, Martin moves his head to look over Jon's shoulder. Though he can't see his boyfriend's face from this angle, he can see how it is slowly growing red at the edge of his vision. He decides not to tease him on it, instead content with letting a smile spread across his face and slowly guiding their joined hands in the proper motion.Or, Martin teaches Jon how to make bread.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 12
Kudos: 208





	A Bread Made in Heaven

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to @themlet on tumblr and their anons for inspiring this "short 500 word drabble"

Bread is easy to make if you stick to the basics.

All you really need is some flour, salt, yeast, water, a mixing bowl, and, of course, an oven. Just stick to the normal ratios of flour to water, knead it a little, and in about two hours, you'll be left with a nice, usable dough. After that, it's just a matter of shaping it and putting it in the oven until the crust is a nice golden colour. That's really all there is to it.

The simplicity and familiarity of it is why Martin's so glad Jon asks about teaching him how to bake bread, and not something else, like cake, or, God forbid, anything resembling pastry dough. Which isn't to say that Martin would have refused Jon's request for baking lessons if his boyfriend had been a little overly ambitious. He doesn't have it in him to refuse such a request. Still, he'll admit this is a lot less stressful, mostly because Martin knows they have very little chance of messing up so bad they end up with something inedible. 

That's why Martin is calm as he watches his boyfriend comb through their small kitchen looking for all the ingredients. Martin knows where everything is, he tries to find the time to bake at least twice a month, and generally just cooks the most often out of the two of them, but Jon had gotten stubborn, and decided he needed to do everything himself, including finding the ingredients.

Jon's doing pretty well so far, considering the chaotic system Martin uses to organize the kitchen. The big bag of flour is pretty hard to miss, and Martin always places the salt with the spices on the rack by the stove. The yeast took a few minutes of digging through the fridge, but that's not really Jon's fault, the fridge has been due for a good cleaning out for the last six months, and both of them have been avoiding the task.

Jon smiles as he finds the yeast, "Finally! Found it!" he closes the fridge, turning around to show Martin the familiar container, before placing it on the counter next to the salt. "Alright, I've gotten all the ingredients. Now, I just need you to remind me how much flour I need."

Martin looks at Jon, then at the counter behind him. It's empty, except for the ingredients he's found, a single wooden spoon, and a few measuring cups for the ingredients. Nowhere to actually combine said ingredients in sight.

"I think you're still missing something," Martin replies.

The other man frowns, confused, "What did I forget?" He turns, starts listing out everything he's taken out, "I have flour, salt, and the, oh." he stops himself mid-sentence, turning back around to look at Martin, "I need something to mix all of this in, don't I?"

"Yeah," Martin smiles, trying not to obviously glance up at the cupboard he's very deliberately placed his bowls in, "That might help."

Jon nods, and start opening cupboards, looking for mixing bowls. He finds them quickly enough, they're not hidden or anything. They're just, well... out of reach, if Martin puts it kindly.

Jon tries to reach for them, getting up on the tips of his toes, and even trying to jump a few times, but he doesn't manage to get a grip on anything but the front of the shelf Martin's placed his bowls on. Jon starts moving things around on the counter, and Martin thinks he's about to just jump onto their clean counter with his dirty socks to get the bowls when Jon stops and seems to remember that Martin's right there behind him, watching all of this.

Jon sighs and looks at Martin, "Martin, will you help me get those?"

Martin smiles at his boyfriend, "Of course I will, love." He walks toward Jon, getting closer than he would need to if his plan was to simply reach up and get the bowls. Instead, Martin leans down slightly, wrapping his arms around Jon's waist, "Is this okay?" he asks.

"Yes, of course, but I don't understand what you're-" Jon's voice cuts off with a gasp when, without warning, Martin grips him tighter and _lifts_. 

As soon as Martin's lifted him up to an adequate height and gotten them stable, Jon's arms move up to cover his face.

"Martin..." Jon whines, voice muffled thanks to his hands.

"What's wrong?" he asks, teasing, "Is this not high enough? I can lift you up more if you want."

"Martin," Jon repeats, in the same tone, stretching out the syllables of his name, "you know that's not the issue." 

"Then I'm afraid I don't know what the issue is, honey."

Jon laughs, "Please don't play dumb right now." Despite his complaints, he removes one of his hands from his face and takes the bowls out of the cupboard.

Martin gently places Jon back on the ground, "Got everything you needed up there?" he asks.

Jon places the bowls on the counter a bit harshly, the _clang_ of the metal loud in the room. Finally, Martin can see his face clearly, and admire the blush that has spread all the way to his ears.

"That was absolutely unnecessary," Jon says, but it's devoid of any heat, and even as he says it, the corners of his mouth are tilting up into a smile.

Martin leans down and kisses his boyfriend, placing a hand on his cheek and feeling how warm it is. "You loved it though," he says as they separate.

Jon rolls his eyes but doesn't deny it. Martin shifts, giving Jon enough to room to comfortably work and watches silently as Jon picks out a bowl from the stacks he'd gotten off the shelf. The bowl he picks out is a size larger than what Martin usually uses, but it doesn't matter, so he decides not to say anything about it.

"Okay," Jon says, "let's try this again." Though the blush is mostly gone by now, Martin is happy to see that there's still a wide smile stuck to his boyfriend's face, something that doesn't happen all that often. "I know that we need two cups of water, one tablespoon of yeast and one of salt. I just don't remember how much flour we need."

"We're going to need about 5 cups of flour," Martin answers simply.

Jon nods and gets to work. Martin is happy he had the foresight to start them off with measuring cups instead of weight, because Jon takes his time, making sure every single measurement is as precise as it could possibly be. Martin wants to tell him that the precision isn't necessary, there's already a fair amount lost just from using cups instead of grams, and the recipe is forgiving enough that they can get away with a lot, but Jon has this focused look in his eyes that means he's enjoying his task, so he lets his boyfriend struggle to get _ exactly _ the amount of flour needed without letting any stick to the bottom between scoops.

Once everything is measured out, the initial steps of just mixing everything together are easy. Jon puts the water with the yeast and salt, and they let it rest for a few minutes, giving the yeast a chance to foam up. They spend that time in comfortable silence, Jon absentmindedly tracing patterns on top of the hand Martin's placed on the counter. After, Jon slowly adds the flour, mixing with the spoon fairly often, until all the flour has been mixed in with the rest, and they're left with a ball of very soft, very sticky dough.

"Alright, so, what do we have to do now?" Jon asks, putting down the spoon and looking over at Martin.

"Now," As he speaks, Martin notices that his boyfriend has somehow managed to get a bit of flour on his left cheek. Without really thinking about it, Martin licks his thumb and wipes it off, "we give the dough ten minutes to rest, and then we knead it."

"Oh," Jon wipes at the spot Martin just cleaned, "I don't think I know how to do that."

"Then I'll show you," Martin says, a smile spreading across his face, "The point of this is for me to teach you how to make bread, not for you to magically know how to make something you've never tried before."

"I, uh," Jon takes one of Martin's hands, apparently desperate for physical contact, and smiles, "I suppose so."

They spend the ten minutes talking about nothing. Martin starts on one of Georgie's new projects, which ends up with them talking about The Admiral, which brings them to talk about getting a cat again.

When the ten minutes have passed, Jon drops the subject, pointing at the clock on the stove, and Martin gets to work.

He's acutely aware of Jon's eyes on him as spreads flour across a cutting board, and slowly uses the spoon to get the dough out of the bowl in one piece. 

"So," Martin says, flouring his hands, "I'll show you how I usually do this once, and then you can take over. That sound alright?"

"Sounds perfect." 

Martin nods and gets to work. It's such a familiar motion after years of doing this that he needs to stop himself from doing it too quickly. He stretches out the dough, folds it, and turns it at a 90-degree angle.

Abruptly, he realizes he should probably also explain what he's doing, not just do it a little slower than he usually would, "So, um, all you need to do is stretch the dough out from underneath, and fold it onto the top," he says as he repeats the same motion as before, "and, then, you turn it so you can do that on each side.

Martin does it twice more until he's back on the side he started with. Jon's gaze doesn't get less intense with every repetition of the motion. It starts off on his hands during the two first times Martin repeats the motion. Before shifting to his face in the final two cycles.

"Think you're ready to take over?" Martin asks, shaking the excess flour off his hands.

"Sure," Jon answers as he spreads flour onto his own hands.

Martin moves over and watches how his boyfriend handles the dough. He's awkward with it, tentative and gentle, as if scared he might hurt it somehow. But, despite this hesitation, as he kneads it, Martin sees that he's doing it pretty well. 

"Is this, uh, am I doing this right?" Jon asks, still slowly stretching out the dough and folding it onto itself.

Martin starts to agree, say 'yes', when an idea hits him, "Well," he says shifting closer to Jon again, "you could be applying more pressure. Here, let me help you out, dear."

Martin moves fully behind Jon, and reaches around him, putting his hands on top of his boyfriend's. Jon inhales sharply, but doesn't say anything else, just lets Martin's hand rest on top of his.

Martin's hands are bigger, but not big enough to entirely envelop the other's hands, and Jon's hands are much, much warmer than his own are. To see what they're doing, Martin moves his head to look over Jon's shoulder. Though he can't see his boyfriend's face from this angle, he can see it slowly growing red at the edge of his vision. He decides not to tease him on it, instead content with letting a smile spread across his face and slowly guiding their joined hands in the proper motion. Together, Martin guides them to stretch out the dough, fold it onto itself, and turn it around.

It takes about two repetitions of the cycle for Martin to come to the conclusion that, as far as actually kneading dough is concerned, this is perhaps one of the worst ways to do it. The position Martin is in is awkward, Jon's hair is getting in his face, and it's hard to get a sense of how much you're pulling or pushing at something through someone else's hands. But Jon's hands are warm against his, and he's managed to fluster Jon for the second time in the span of an hour, and they're spending time together, close to each other, so it's entirely worth it.

After about five minutes, they do manage to get the dough at a decent enough consistency, at which point Martin takes his hands off of Jon's, and gives him a proper hug, undoubtedly covering his shirt in flour before backing off, "Now, we just need to oil a bowl, put the dough in it, cover it, and let it rest for about two hours."

"Got it," Jon says, before making quick work of Martin's instructions. He spread a thin layer of oil into a clean bowl, picks up the dough, placing it in the new bowl, and covers the entire thing with a clean towel Martin brings him.

"So," Jon asks while washing his hands, "What do you want to do while we wait?"

The question takes Martin by surprise, he's been so focused on Jon throughout this entire thing, he hadn't even given a second thought to actually _ doing _ something while waiting for the dough to rise.

"Um, how would you feel about watching a movie?" He knows Jon isn't really one for television or movies, but Martin figures this is an opportunity for him to take a nap and at least some kind of sleep today.

Just on cue, the other man obviously tries to stifle a yawn, "Yeah, I think I'd like that."

Martin barely looks at the movie he's putting on, it doesn't really matter. He already knows neither of them are going to watch it. Jon's already sprawled himself out on the couch, head resting comfortably in Martin's lap, so it's obvious he's going to be out less than half an hour in. And Martin, well, he's not particularly opposed to a nap right now either. 

He passes his hand through Jon's hair gently, giving himself a mental note to ask Jon later if he wants to get a haircut or let it grow out. He undoes to knots slowly, making sure not to pull too much. It's something he’s taken to doing when Jon's tired and needs help falling asleep. His hair is soft under his fingers, and, in all honesty, Martin finds it just as relaxing as he imagines Jon does.

Jon shifts making it easier for Martin to reach more of his hair, "I'm not falling asleep, Martin. You don't need to do that."

"Of course you're not falling asleep," Martin says, making sure the disbelief is clear in his words, "but you like it when I do this."

Jon hums in agreement but doesn't say anything else, so Martin continues playing with his hair. He can tell the moment Jon falls asleep, his breathing going from mostly silent and just a bit fast, to something a lot more steady, and accompanied by a slight snore that Martin is now very familiar with. Martin's content to just look at his boyfriend sleep, let his heart slowly melt at how beautiful he is and how cute his snore is, but, eventually, his eyes start to close as well, and he lets himself drift off.

He wakes with a start when he feels something move on him, and he immediately starts reaching around for something, for Jon.

A few seconds later, before the panic of not knowing what's going on can set in, Jon grabs his right hand, a warm pressure killing off the little bit of panic that had managed to build up.

"I'm right here," Jon reassures, as Martin looks at him letting the fog from his abrupt awakening fall away, "Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you. It's been two hours, I wanted to go check on the dough before waking you."

Martin shifts the hand Jon has grabbed, enlacing their fingers together, "Let's go check on it together then."

Martin breathes a sigh of relief when he sees that the dough has actually risen. He knew it would, the yeast had foamed up, and, sure, the kneading was shoddy, but not enough to seriously compromise anything. Still, there's always a risk with these kinds of things, Sometimes, it just _ doesn’t_.

Jon watches with the same intensity as earlier as Martin takes the dough out of the bowl, and divides it into two equal parts.

"What do we have to do next?" Jon asks.

"Uh, well, now we have to shape it," Martin says, waving Jon so that he stands next to him, "I'll shape the first one, and then you can do the other." He takes one of the halves of dough and slowly flattens it a bit until it's shaped like a rough rectangle, "First, you want it to get it into something that looks like a rectangle. Then, you get all the corners, and bring them to the middle, pinching them so they stick together, and then, you just flip it over," Martin does exactly that, showing Jon the neat ball of dough he's just made, "And then you have a nice shaped loaf!"

Jon tries to copy Martin's movements, and he does pretty well. It's a bit messier than Martin's, but compared to the first time Martin tried to shape bread dough, it's amazing. 

They place the two balls of dough on a sheet pan, and Martin turns on the oven. They wait for it to get to the right temperature, and Jon puts the sheet pan in the oven. 

The wait until it's finally ready is fun to watch. Jon is uncharacteristically impatient, checking on the oven often. It reminds Martin of when he started baking, always eager to see the result of his hard work.

When the bread is finally ready, and Jon gets to take it out and place both loaves on wire racks, his eyes light up and a smile glues itself on his face. 

"We made this, Martin," he says, his voice slightly awed.

Martin laughs softly, "You did most of the work," he points out, "I'd say _you_ made it, dear."

"You're underestimating the amount of help you gave me," Jon finally rips his attention way away from the bread that needs to cool, sitting next to Martin and linking their hands, "Who knows if I'd have even managed to get the mixing bowls from the cupboard without you? Especially since, last night, you inexplicably moved them from their place underneath the counter to the top shelf you know I can't reach easily."

Martin laughs again, unable to feel embarrassed at being so obviously caught, "And how do you happen to know that?"

"Maybe try not to make so much noise next time you want to sneak around at night in a flat with someone who doesn't sleep," Jon suggests in a teasing tone, smiling back at him.

Martin looks deep into Jon's eyes for a few seconds more, before leaning forward to kiss him. Jon meets him halfway across the space between them. It's a tender kiss, filled with love, that makes Martin's heart beat hard in his chest.

"I love you," he says softly as they break the kiss.

"I love you too," Jon answers, not hesitating for a second, and squeezing their linked hands. 

They sit in silence for a few minutes, Jon's eyes drifting between Martin and the bread they've just made, which should be ready to eat in just a few minutes.

"So," Jon says, looking at the bread in front of him, "are we going to do this again?"

The question feels ridiculous to Martin. Just the thought of doing this again is making his heart melt, and a genuine smile spread across his face, "Of course." Jon's face relaxes, like he hadn't been sure that Martin would actually say yes, "I think I’ll show you how to braid the dough next time."

“I can’t wait.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed!  
You can find me on tumblr @lightclerics.  
Comments and kudos appreciated!!


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